Program 6 at 10:00 am

ART FOR A SEA CHANGE (USA), 4 min
John Quigley
Listen, Unite, Protect, Save Our Seas. Starting in San Francisco, twenty years ago, over a hundred thousand youth from California to China have connected with the sea – cleaning beaches and sending ocean messages scribed in the sand with their own bodies. —DM

CHIRIPAJAS (Russia/Spain), 2 min
Olga Poliektova & Jaume Quiles
This film tells the big adventure of one small baby turtle. Lost and trapped in ocean pollution, he strives to reach the ocean and search for his family. A beach cleanup saves the day! —GC

STRAWS (USA), 33 minLinda Booker*
It is estimated that each day in the U.S. alone up to 500 million plastic straws are used once and thrown away. Sound like a problem for the environment? This look at the history of straws and their impact on the environment will make you reconsider how you order your next drink. —ST

A HERRING OPERA (USA), 27 min
Tessa Schmidt*
WORLD PREMIERE
Stylistically unique, this film portrays the spring herring fishing season in Sitka, Alaska. Presented as an “opera’ in several acts, it presents the drama between commercial fishing operations and the local fishermen. Interwoven in the story are details of life in a small Alaskan town and the beauty of the spawning herring. —ST

IRREPARABLE HARM (USA), 20 min
Colin Arisman & Connor Gallagher
In Alaska, a Tlingit settlement must abandon traditional foods, and perhaps their homes. A silver mine’s mercury- and lead-tainted discharge pours into Knight Inlet in vast quantities, poisoning marine life that the Tlingit depend on. Faced with blatant lies, “disappeared” studies, and industry stonewalling, the state turns a blind eye. But natives and scientists push back: “If you call out to the Earth, Earth can hear you.” —MJS

RETURN OF THE HARBOR PORPOISES (USA), 10 min
Jim Sugar
In the late 1930s, San Francisco Bay was dying. Sewage, industrial waste and military preparations for World War II sounded a death knell for the Bay's marine life. The shy, diminutive porpoises that lived here disappeared. Then activists and agencies decided to heal the bay, and 65 years later biologists documented the porpoises’ lusty return. This film is a song of homecoming, of hope. —MJS

Program 7 at 1:00 pm

Shark Program

SHARK WEDDING PSA (USA), 1 min
Andrew Wegst
When millions of sharks have ended up as the featured dish in soup at prestigious events, perhaps soon they will become the guest of honor. —DM

SEEKING SANCTUARY (UK), 11 min
Nick Jones*
Shark researcher Ornella Weideli‘s laboratory is the remote, uninhabited St. Joseph’s atoll in the Seychelles in the Indian Ocean. It has become a sanctuary for a wide diversity of wildlife, including baby sharks whose primary predators in the shallow lagoon are their cousins. —KH

DEDICATE: DIVING FREE (Norway), 8 min
Shams
A chemical engineer turned free-diving photographer, Jacques de Vos has pursued his love for orcas since childhood. He shares the magic and wonder of being in the water and interacting with humpback whales and orcas off the coast of Norway. —YI

THE MYSTERY OF THE GNARALOO SEA TURTLES (Australia) 24 min
Dof Dickinson
WORLD PREMIERE
See stunning underwater footage that tracks the mysterious journey of the Gnaraloo Loggerhead turtles in Western Australia. Scientists attached satellite trackers and underwater cameras to the backs of female turtles for the first time. Dive in and learn about life after they leave nesting beaches. —GC

ISLANDS FROM MEXICO: REVILLAGIGEDO ARCHIPELAGO (Mexico) 49 min Nadia Rojas
The gem of the Mexican Pacific Ocean, this remote archipelago hosts hammerhead sharks, humpback whales and some of the best diving in the Northeast Pacific Ocean. Brought to light by dive ecotourism, this Mexican Galapagos has also become the target of tuna fishers and shark finners. A team of Mexican biologists explore and study this subtropical biodiversity and help establish the largest no-fishing marine reserve off North America. —DM

Program 8 at 4:00 pm

68 VOICES (Mexico) 1 min
Nadia Rojas
This is a story of the cosmogony of the Seri people in northern Mexico. All the animals in the sea dived down to bring sand up from the depths of the ocean, but only the largest sea turtle that ever lived — the Caguama — succeeded. From that sand the Earth was created. —GC

REEFS AT RISK (USA), 11 min
Malina Fagan
Something else to worry about. The health of reefs near Hawaii started to decline around 1985, that was about the same time the tourist industry in the islands exploded. Any connection? All those visitors are lathered in sunscreen that often includes the chemical oxybenzone, an endocrine disruptor, lethal to coral—and fish, and dolphins (and maybe you). Who knew? —KH

THESE FISH ARE ALL ABOUT SEX ON THE BEACH (USA), 4 min
Joshua Cassidy
Shortly after a new full moon and high tides, the California grunion come out of the sea and onto the beach for an unusual mass mating tryst. The resulting offspring must find their way to the sea, and it is not easy. —ST

ADAPTATION BANGLADESH: SEA LEVEL RISE (USA/Bangladesh), 12 min
Justin DeShields*
WEST COAST PREMIERE
Glacial waters from northern mountains and the warming waters of the Bay of Bengal are expected, by 2050, to force 16 million Bangladeshi from their homes. These resourceful people have adapted: Schools are on boats with rooftop solar panels to power computers. Thriving vegetable gardens float on mats of water hyacinth. Self-sufficient floating villages are being planned. Such adaptations offer models to the many others who will one day share their plight. —SJPH

TOUCHED BY THE OCEAN (Latvia), 68 min
Laura Rožkalne-Ozola & Sandijs Semjonovs
WEST COAST PREMIERE
We are familiar with the trials of the laid-back Anglo Saxons who endeavor to cross wide expanses of water in puny vessels. But when two inexperienced Latvians set out to row across the South Atlantic their experiences, even their discomforts, are both intimate and joyful. —KH

Program 9 at 7:00 pm

FROM THE SHADOWS (Spain), 15 min
Jacques de Vos
Boats from Tromso fish In the Norwegian fiords for herring and cod. The wildlife is out too, including whales. The sound of the fishing boats brings in orcas and humpback whales from 10 miles away. Pods come in to catch the fish that escape the nets. Some whales are eating the spoils, and others are sky hopping to watch the fish brought aboard and anticipate the next to fall out. In the water, alongside the whales, day and night, are videographers recording it all. —KH

OCEANIC ALIENS (USA), 6 min
Mike Johnson*
What really lies in the depths of our oceans? How much do we really know about what lives there? More is known about outer space than our oceans. This short documentary illustrates just one example of a little-known class of bioluminescent species and their amazing attributes. —AB

THE ISLANDS AND THE WHALES (UK), 81 min
Mike Day
Denmark’s Faroe Islands are under siege. Heirs to the impacts of overfishing and pollution — their own and other countries' — the Faroese find scant fish in the sea and few seabirds on their once-crowded rookeries. Facing ecological, economic and cultural collapse, Faroese proudly cling to at least one tradition: an annual hunt called the Grind, during which coves run red with the blood of pilot whales. —MJS